


Dissonance

by fatiguedfern



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: F/M, Post-Canon, Spoilers, maki appears for all of 5 seconds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-28
Updated: 2017-07-28
Packaged: 2018-12-07 14:22:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11625405
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fatiguedfern/pseuds/fatiguedfern
Summary: Kaede teaches Saihara how to play the piano.





	Dissonance

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [Nikki](https://justthingsandstuffandcrap.tumblr.com/) for the ndrv3christmasinjuly gift exchange.

Saihara tugs at the thick material with steady hands and the slightest of cracks forms at the seams of the cloth shrouding the room in shadow. Sunlight leaks through the narrow opening, specks of dust dancing through the illuminated air. 

Saihara regards the patterned velvet with a tired sigh and with one last heave pulls apart the heavy curtains, light flooding the room. And maybe it’s a small accomplishment, but his fingers remain lax and the shadows are banished to the edges of the whitewashed walls and he can’t help the small swell of pride that bubbles in his throat. Even insignificant things had become taxing.

The glossed wood of the piano reflects a dulled glow in the mid-morning sun and it’s almost natural for Saihara to run his fingers across the sleek top. His fingers come away grime-free. He wouldn’t have to give the instrument a polish, then.

The piano’s a mystery, really; bought with his meagre savings from the job at the dump of a cafe hidden well enough for him to work at. (It’s hardly as if Team DanganRonpa wouldn’t have paid if asked, but he couldn’t pay with their blood money. Not for something like this.) Workdays had been long and it had taken him twice as long as initially thought to save for the beat up spinet sat in the window of a pawn shop with all the shattered glasses and jumbled orders. But it’d been well worth it when he’d seen Kaede’s beaming face.

The nicks and scrapes scattered across the surface had likely told a story once. He almost felt guilty covering the dented memories in coatings of varnish, but he shouldn’t have been. Glossing over things wasn’t unusual.

“Y’know, pianos are meant to be played, not stared at, Shuuichi-kun.”

He can almost feel the blush blossoming across his cheeks at his given name spoken, heart fluttering and face likely aflame. 

“Ah, good morning Akamatsu-san,” Saihara squeaks. No matter the time that passes, he can’t seem to get used the familiarity that comes with the name.

“Kaede,” she chides lightly. “And good morning to you too. Ready to start?”

“Ready,” Saihara nods a tad too quickly and goes to open the window of the suddenly stifling room, hand clasped to the slope of his neck which was surely infected by blush by now.

Kaede busies herself with examining the white-walled space for the umpteenth time since when her visits to the room had started. “Hmmm, it’s pretty bare here. You should think of redecorating.”

Saihara slides the glass screen upwards, morning air whistling over the windowsill from the bustling street below. “I don’t think it’s really necessary, Kaede-san. The space serves its purpose. Besides, I don’t have much to fill this place with anyway.” Saihara pauses, thinking of posters and plushies painted monochrome and pink buried at the bottom of his cupboard, then finally settling onto the edge of the bench Kaede perched. 

“What are we playing today?” he asks, fiddling with the cover still pulled closed over the keys.

Kaede hums thoughtfully as she skims through the sheet music strewn haphazardly on the music rack with the gentleness of the breeze curling around their feet. “We’ll start with scales first and then see where we get.”

They work through warbled note by note, Kaede’s experienced hands guiding Saihara’s own.

“Press harder. The keys won’t break.”

“Repeat that last bar.”

“Pick up the pace a bit, Shuuichi-kun!”

“Be careful, you keep tripping on this note!”

By the time they finally manage to get Saihara playing a competent enough melody to satisfy Kaede, it’s late afternoon and the sun is on the brink of falling. Saihara slumps over the sunset-dipped keyboard; his back aching and focus depleted. 

“We can call it a day, if you want.” Worry threads Kaede’s voice.

Saihara shakes his head from his slouched position. “I’m fine. Go on.”

Kaede raise an eyebrow at his insistence, half disbelieving and half amused. She taps a finger against another page of sheet music. “Let’s try this then.”

Saihara lets out a moan as he eyes the title. An easy enough piece for beginners, but also his most hated.

The melody starts off as steadily as possible. The shakey notes ring clear, but despite a solid start, Saihara’s fingers inevitably itch.

Slowly, surely, keys slip from underneath his outstretched fingers until it all comes crashing down as his quaking palms collapse and splay across the ebony and ivory tiles. Unmoving except for the tremors that ripple across translucent flesh.

Kaede approaches carefully. “Come on. You need to rest.” 

“No, I’m fine. Just need a breather.”

She puffs out her cheeks and huffs, “You’re clearly not fine. You’ve been playing for a good few hours and it’s taken its toll on you. We can practice again tomorrow.” Kaede’s hands ghost across his back in reassurance, fingers tracing the notes of a piece he wouldn’t even know where to begin recognising if it weren’t for the fact that the swirling fingers pressed against his back had begun a ritual performed more often than Saihara would like to admit. The beginnings of _Clair De Lune_ writhe across his spine and it calms his trembling heart and fingers slightly.

“No, you don’t know that. My hands could shake so badly that I can’t open the door tomorrow. You could be gone tomorrow,” Saihara reaches up to cover his face with the brim of his hat, only for his hand to brush through air. “God knows, it wouldn’t be the first time you left.”

Kaede halts mid stroke. “People leave, Shuuichi. Things change. It’s only natural.” 

“That doesn’t make it right.”

“Maybe, but you’re here.”

“I could leave.”

Kaede hums out a laugh. “If that were true you wouldn’t still be here.”

“You’re still here too… I guess that makes it better.”

She smiles sadly and turns back to the keyboard. “Try playing it again.”

~

Maki stands in the gaping doorway, watching as Saihara laughs and cries and whispers to an empty room. Neither of them mention it, but both Yumeno and herself had seen him like this inside of the mostly bare room before; both at his best and worst as he smiled with a dead memory.

There’s something so innately private about the scene that Maki can’t force herself to observe from the shadows of Saihara’s fantasy and clicks the door shut. Hoping that Yumeno had one of her dumb cartoons playing to distract her, Maki marches away; head craned as far away as humanly possible from the source of clattering piano playing. 

The muffled playing lasts until early morning. The disembodied version of the _Flea Waltz_ echoes throughout the apartment for far longer.

**Author's Note:**

> If you thought this was fluff I'm sorry


End file.
